Away from the big bases, Afghan war vets struggle to find support

Portrait of Randy Hamelin, a registered professional counsellor and equine professional with horses at his farm in Lakeshore, Ontario on February 7, 2012.

Photograph by: JASON KRYK
, The Windsor Star

WINDSOR, Ont. — It wasn't until his best friend, Stefan Jankowski, 25, killed himself that calls for help from a young Windsor, Ont., Afghan veteran began to get noticed.

"Right away, I had people knocking on my door, making sure I was still alive," said "Sam Smith," recalling the tragic day last summer.

"I was probably weeks away from what happened to Stefan," said the 23-year-old who, like Jankowski, was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD, upon his return from Kandahar.

Smith, who was a corporal, asked that his real name not be used, explaining he doesn't want to jeopardize the assistance he's getting from Veterans Affairs Canada.

Traumatic memories, including having a friend die in his arms, left Jankowski addicted to PTSD drugs and plagued by hallucinations and nightmares.

He was discharged after run-ins with the law and going AWOL from CFB Petawawa. Jankowski was on a waiting list for out-of-town help with his mental health issues when he died.

His family says the military had "washed their hands of him" after he returned.

A year ago, Smith was also discharged after an injury led to an addiction to painkillers.

Smith says he's now off booze and drugs, but there are still times when memories bring back anxiety.

"Then I stay awake, I have a cigarette, I let time pass . . . if I fall asleep — it's the terrors," he told a group of vets recently at a therapy session at a Windsor-area horse stable.

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While the regular forces have support networks around bases and urban centres, the offerings are leaner elsewhere, especially for reservists or those who have left the military.

About 5,000 of the 39,000 Canadian Forces personnel deployed in Afghanistan since 2001 have been reservists, including almost a fifth of those rotated through the country in 2008, according to CF figures.

"I've heard so many horror stories — I don't think the Canadian public knows the true picture of what the soldiers are facing when they come back," said Wayne Hillman, who is active with the legion and veterans' support groups in the Windsor area.

While the vast majority of soldiers don't develop post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), a military study last year found that about eight per cent of those who have returned from Afghanistan are suffering symptoms.

The rate was double for those in the infantry who did the actual fighting, according to the report, gleaned from the medical charts of returning soldiers.

"It's not a surprise at all . . . the more involved you are in the battle, the higher the risk," says Col. Rakesh Jetly, the head psychiatrist of the Canadian Forces.

That means there are thousands of young men and women suffering PTSD among the 39,000 soldiers deployed to Afghanistan.

"People are coming for help in greater numbers than ever," said Jetly, who is also a mental health adviser to the surgeon general.

Hillman, a Vietnam vet who was himself diagnosed with PTSD, says reservists and ex-soldiers "have to fight extra hard," he said.

He notes it's "a fact of the game" that most young vets refuse to seek help, either due to fears they'd lose face to their peers or worries about future career prospects.

"It's sad to see, but some of these kids . . . you know they're hurting, but they don't want to come out," said Hillman.

Even coming out doesn't guarantee success: Sam Smith was enrolled at Windsor's Brentwood alcohol treatment program but cut his stay short because he said the others in his therapy group couldn't relate to the stories of the horrors he experienced in Afghanistan.

Away from main bases, soldiers and vets and their families have grown their own self-help peer programs, at local legion halls or in coffee shops, to share coping strategies.

East of Windsor, Country Sunset Stables offers veterans free monthly "equine-assisted psychotherapy," where veterans work with horses and therapists to deal with hidden issues. It's been a success, says owner and lead facilitator Randy Hamelin, but there's been no outside financial assistance.

When the fighting in Afghanistan was in full swing, the London (Ontario) Military Family Resource Centre, one of a number of such support facilities set up across Canada, was able to expand its services into Windsor so soldiers and families here didn't have to make the two-hour drive east to access programs and help. But that funding has since been pulled.

Delta Coy, a civilian support arm of a local reservist unit, has been fundraising for the London Military Family Resource Centre's activities, but has also been lobbying to have the Windsor operation re-established.

The London centre's executive director, Gary Willaert, said he's asked again this year for such funding, "but I'm not optimistic." A career soldier and lieutenant-colonel in the reserves, Willaert said it's "harder to pick up on the warning signs" among those outside the regular forces, and he adds it's "disappointing to hear" that some are not finding the help they need.

"I've got 36 years in the military, and the support now is phenomenal compared to what it was . . . there are people out there to help," he said.

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So far Bruce Moncur, a corporal who was injured in a "friendly fire" incident during intense fighting in 2006, hasn't received the help he feels he needs.

Moncur, who lives in Harrow, near Windsor, said a volunteer support organization set up in the area "are the last people I'd go to see" for help.

That group is trying to fill in the gap left by the loss of the London Resource Centre presence in the area. The group's leader initially agreed to an interview for this story, wanting to highlight concerns about the treatment of ex-soldiers locally, but then begged off, worried the publicity could harm attempts at getting more of those in need to come forward.

"At times I'm a miserable bastard, I cannot function," said Moncur. Having lost a portion of his brain, and still living with shrapnel the surgeons couldn't remove, Moncur, 28, is bitter about his treatment by the military.

"I don't want to be a sob story, (but) I want people to know . . . nobody cares about you," said Moncur. Six years later, he's studying under the University of Windsor's student disability services program but is still waging a fight against the military bureaucracy over compensation.

He suffers headaches, is easily fatigued and has much difficulty with short-term memory and with any types of multi-tasking.

His girlfriend, Ashley Brunette, calls Moncur "good-willed, very charismatic and big-hearted." But she also describes a walking-on-eggshells relationship due to outbursts, which can be triggered by something as simple as the cat meowing.

Moncur feels he's not getting the help he needs, and he's insulted by the amount of compensation he was offered for his wounds.

Employing the army's so-called "meat chart," which provides wounded warriors a lump-sum payment of up to a quarter-million dollars for lost limbs, Moncur's loss of five per cent of his brain was deemed worth a cheque for $22,000.

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Many of those contacted for this story would either not comment or only do so anonymously. Stigma is still a big problem, even though Rakesh Jetly, head psychiatrist for the Canadian Forces, said Canada probably does more for its returning soldiers than most of its allies, including having "the highest ratio of mental health professionals in NATO."

Challenges remain, Jetly says, but what's referred to as PTSD today is something that goes back thousands of years: "There have never been wars without psychological casualties."

He feels the military and soldiers are ahead of the public in general when it comes to understanding, accepting and dealing with post-traumatic stress.

"People aren't waiting anymore . . . they seek help," said Jetly. Last year's Canadian Forces survey, based on the health screening and post-deployment survey of soldiers, would appear to back that up, with one of the findings showing close to a third of all deployed personnel received some form of specialty mental health care after their return.

"Getting me into therapy fixed my life," said Smith. "We need to help the guys . . . before somebody else has to end up dead."

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